Inexplicable
by purplegod
Summary: Death. It is an unexplainable and unexpected feeling, even when expected. Truly the greatest mystery to life, for more reasons than I originally thought. What will happen when a lazy, apathetic, sarcastic, and nerdy child is reborn into the village hidden in the leaves on October 10th as Uzumaki Naruto's Brother and container of the other half of the Nine Tails? Self-insert.
1. Prologue

AN: There is no AN!

Disclaimer: Naruto does not belong to me. ;)

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Chapter 1: Prologue

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Death. It is an unexplainable and unexpected feeling, even when expected. It truly is the greatest mystery to life, for more reasons than I originally thought. Many think that when you get close enough to death you will suddenly, magically, find the true meaning of your life, that all will be explained. They couldn't have been more wrong.

Death is not the time of judgement, your final branding. Good or bad, evil or heroic, heaven or hell. No, in death, everyone is equal, no one can escape. The time of judgement is during life, when you can be punished for your actions fairly, or unfairly.

Death is not clarity, death is confusion, for both living and dying. During death you feel a sudden surge of emotions, unlike any you've felt ever before, and emotions most definitely do not provide clarity. Even if you feel like you have prepared yourself for this moment of chaos, when you realize that your time has come, you will try to fight it with all of your being. Everyone does so differently, some scream, some thrash, others just lay still and internally face the struggle, but, it is always a desperate fight.

Death is an unexplainable mystery. The feeling of your soul being ripped out of your body, which is then discarded like trash. It was tantalizing, but also so much more. A true mystery. Personally, I did not thrash or scream, it was impossible for me to, after all. I believed it was an easy way to go. Quick, simple, painless. A sweet and easy pop through the brain, definitely the best way to go, in my humble opinion.

That is, of course, until I tried it out myself. The moment directly after that nice squeeze, before the hammer hit the bullet, I had instant regret. Time seemed to slow down to the point where a nanosecond took an hour, and all I could do was watch as the hammer went down and ignited the gunpowder. All hope was lost as the bullet started to dig into my skull and I felt every ounce of pain caused by the damn thing. Dead. Gone. No more to be seen out of that pathetic life.

Death is one of the strangest experiences I have ever existed through. I was extremely shocked when I could feel myself leave my physical body, greatly due to the fact that I did not believe in the afterlife during my lifetime. I thought that I would pull that trigger, it would be over before I could blink, and that would be that. I'd be gone, no 'soul,' no anything afterwords. Just nothing, just gone, simple as that. But I was very, very wrong.

After I died I lost everything, all of my senses, my body, everything. Everything except for my memories and my ability to think. I did not know where I was, what was happening around me, if anything was happening, or if there was anything. In this void I just knew that I was, and I did not like my lack of power, or my lack of presence. This was when I truly realized that I liked my senses and bodily functions, loved them even. I did not think it through when I took my life, it was a horrible, devastating mistake that would be my greatest regret, but also my greatest success. I started panicking, flipping out, I went into rages, horrible tantrums that seemed to encompass my whole being. I stayed there for what seemed like years and years, not having anything to do, nothing to reflect on, nothing to interact with, nothing at all. I couldn't even go to sleep to pass the time, it was absolutely horrible. It was far worse than the life that I rid myself of. Far, far worse. I vowed to myself that If I somehow managed to get another body, another chance, that I would live as long as I possibly could and beyond. Even if I fell into depression like last time, even if my life was pointless, even if there was no joy in it, it was better than this.

It was directly after this decision that things started to change. I could feel again, it was as if the universe was testing me, and once I reached that conclusion, I would pass and be given a new body, a new mind, a new life. The next senses were hearing, taste, and smell, although the taste and smell were useless wherever I was, which I assumed to be in my pregnant mother, which is not where I had hoped or thought I would end up, oddly enough. Ignoring that, I could hear voices, in a completely different language than what I spoke. Completely different, and extremely confusing, to me at least. I decided that I might as well get to work and start learning that baby ASAP, especially because I could not see, or communicate to these people in any way at all, which would be incredibly stressful and annoying to deal with any longer than necessary. I quickly realized that my movements were extremely limited, and it was difficult to speak, so I opted for memorization without vocalization.

However depressing it was, I was incredibly happy to have even this level of movement and mental stimulation, however little. I tried as hard as possible to learn this new language, and even though it was incredibly difficult, I was incredibly happy for it, after all, I had just gotten out of the most solitary type of confinement that exists: the 'afterlife.'

My days continued like this for a while, and I had no real sense of time because everything around me was black. So, when I was suddenly bombarded by bright, unforgiving rays of light I immediately recoiled from them, my new eyes slowly adjusting to the so far foreign waves. Then, very soon afterwards, I smiled, my first smile in a very, very long time. I had been born again, I had undergone something that no one else in my knowledge ever had before. Something truly magical. The possibilities in this life were endless, more endless than I had ever thought.

This feeling… the feeling of being reborn, was very similar to death, but it was also as different from death as you could ever possibly get. It was truly, truly inexplicable.


	2. The Second Beginning

**AN: I decided that in this story I will not have watched or read the Naruto anime/ manga. I decided to do this because I want to explore how I honestly think I would react to a situation like this with no knowledge on how the world works as well as to keep my story somewhat original and more interesting. Also, about the ramen, it's actually true. No joke. Well, not instant ramen, just professionally made ramen. Also, I know this might seem ridiculous to say so early on and with comparatively little numbers, but here it is, thank you. Thank you to those that have either followed or faved this story. I never knew why people were always ranting about this stuff in the AN's before now, but now that I'm the one doing it, it makes perfect sense to me. Even though no one (at this moment) has reviewed yet, and there is a max of like fifteen follows/ faves, I am incredibly happy about it. This is my first story and to see that someone, anyone enjoyed it, let alone ten people, in the first two days, is extremely motivating for me. I stayed up till three AM the day I released my first chapter writing because of how happy it made me. Honestly, I was the happiest that I have been in a while. So thank you, and please, continue your support.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.**

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Chapter 2: _The Second Beginning_

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My smile was ripped off of my face the moment I seemingly teleported away from who I assumed to be my second pair of parents: a woman with only one defining feature. Hair of an extremely deep shade of red, the shade that you would get if you dyed your hair the reddest red you could find, which is exactly what I assumed she had done. There was also a man, his most defining feature being, well, once again, the hair. He had spiky golden locks. He must have used uncountable quantities of bottles of gel to keep up his desired do. Moving on from my parents hair, I had seemed to have been kidnapped. I seemed to have been kidnapped, and in record time actually. First, oh I don't know, 10 seconds of life? Yep, off to a great start already. Just perfect.

I, being the extremely rational and logical human being that I was thought, you know? I gotta fix this. Completely forgetting that I was in fact, a baby. There was no chance that I could resist the man that was looming over my pathetic form. To sum it up, being a baby sucked.

So, in hopes of being able to do something or another, I quickly and 'expertly' checked my surroundings and noticed that, along with my parents caring way too much about their luscious locks, they also found joy in doing things in a very traditional manner. Namely, having their babies in caves! Caves! Who has their baby in a cave! That's horribly inefficient! So, despite my parents deciding to have their children in caves, or dungeons, couldn't really tell, I decided that I ought to give all of my attention to my kidnapper, who was at least smart enough to wear a mask. He seemed to be threatening me along with my brother, who shockingly enough already had spiky blond hair! How the fuck does that happen! Jesus Christ, babies aren't even supposed to have **any** hair! At this point, I knew something was up. I knew this world was fucked up in some way. Babies do **not** have that kind of hair when they're born, unless they are mutant babies, which, admittedly, would be really sick. Unless, of course, the mutations were limited to the hair genes, and… were those whiskers? You know what, don't answer that. I don't care anymore. If babies can have whiskers and people can have natural spikes in their hair, I obviously know nothing. Nothing except that I really, really wanted to have spiky hair, I mean, the stuff looks like it came straight out of an anime, it's awesome. Not sure about the whiskers though… just have to wait and see for myself, I guess.

Well, anyways, there is this masked dude holding up a **massive** knife to my throat, I mean absolutely _massive_. Like not only _long_ but like, _thick_ you know? Just a _huge_ _hunk_ of metal. And he was just _shoving_ it into my face, it was really rude, and in my book, kind of a _dick_ move. I couldn't really do much to him, being a baby and all, so I decided to just try to freak the dude out, couldn't hurt could it? Also would probably fail miserably because I was likely just an adorable little munchkin, and all I could do was use my face muscles. Everything else was restricted. So, I looked him, gave him the sharpest smile I could possibly form and said six of the very few words that I had learned in this foreign language, I said "Hey, I wanna play, ya know?"

This seemed to succeed in completely shocking all of the adults in the room, not necessarily terrifying them, but definitely shocking them. Maybe slight creeping out. All of them froze. No more yelling, no more trading of people's, which was what appeared to be happening. My mom for me and my brother? Nonetheless, the adults froze, all looking down at me in a mixture of shock, and admiration. Shock from the fact that a child, not born even 2 minutes ago had spoken, and, the admiration, that came from me being able to make innocent words sound like I wanted to kill somebody. They also acknowledged the fact that I would undoubtedly become one of the most feared people in the entire world, if not based on my physical strength, based on my mind.

However hilarious this method was, it proved to be rather inefficacious because the masked man knew that no matter how smart I was, or would be, I had no physical strength to actually be able to do anything to him. So, after this momentary pause, which lasted around ten seconds, the exchange continued successfully and my mother was now in the hands of my previous captor and my brother and I were with my father. He promptly teleported to his home in a yellow flash, scaring the shit out of me in the process. This is when I figured out many of the mysteries I had been a victim to until now, the hair, the dim, musty cave, the other hair, and most importantly, my brother's face, hair included. This is when I realized I was not in my world. I either missed with that bullet, which did not seem likely, and went into a coma, or was reborn into a crazy fantasy world. As doltish as it sounds, I do believe that I have been reborn into some crazy ass world with magic spells and magic hair. I am extraordinarily confident that I did not miss.

These were the thoughts on my mind as my 'father' placed my brother and I into one gargantuan wooden crib with a soft mattress, and a thin, silky blanket. I honestly could not tell if my parents had planned for two or not, there was only one crib, but it seemed like it could fit twenty, even thirty children, they probably had no idea what to expect and just decided to have insurance in case more than one baby popped out.

As quickly as spiky had brought us here, he left. Teleported away, most likely to fight with the man that had our mother, he did still have her as a captive, after all. Seeing that I was stuck in a crib, and had no way to escape, sneaky parents, getting a custom crib with no doors! Anyways, back to the point, I was stuck in a crib, so I promptly plopped onto my ass, leaned against the wall and took in the incredibly homey environment that I was in. The lights were bright, but not blindingly so. They emitted more of a yellow glow, what you expect from older Incandescent light bulbs rather than fluorescent ones. As I sat there and relaxed I heard great explosions and saw bright flashes of light in the distance, along with the occasional roar. I just sat there and waited, waited for the fighting to be over.

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It had been a very, very long time since I had been afraid. Sure, I had some moments of 'fear' recently in my previous life, a prime example being when I shot myself, but in that situation the overriding emotion was actually anger. Anger at myself, sure but still, I was pissed. Out of all of my experiences in my previous life, I cannot say that any of them were as terrifying as this moment. How could they be? I was powerless, not only was I powerless, I was also staring straight at the most terrifying thing that I had ever seen, not a good combo. I was powerless as my father faced down a hulking behemoth of a fox. Singlehandedly! Granted, I was extremely happy and impressed to have such a powerful man as a father, but nonetheless I was terrified. Terrified at my lack of power in this reputedly, extremely harsh world that I now inhabited.

I watched in horror as my mother crawled up to the altar that my sibling and I occupied, only for my dad to jump right behind her as a massive claw impaled the pair and stopped inches away from my face, inches! Good thing I had selfless parents because if I did not, I would have died already. I knew the second that they were skewered that they would die. I knew this not only from the massive claw protruding from their stomachs, which certainly helped, but also from the look that appeared in their eyes. I knew that look well, I had seen it before, on myself. I knew that they were going to use all of the juice they had left to save us and rid the world of this monster. They were going to kill themselves, but for a cause. I couldn't help it, my mask that I held throughout my entire other life fell off and I did something that had been very much needed for a very long time, I cried. Not the crying typical of a child, with shrieks and wails. No, silent tears fell down my cheeks, the type of tears that are ordinarily only seen on hardened warriors, veterans. The tears of someone who has a complete understanding of the situation, and knows that all efforts would be wasted and hopeless as they are left to weep in solitude. This caused my new parents to look at me in wonder, before they executed their final task.

I watched in misery as glowing chains sprouted from my new mother, binding the multi-tailed beast behind her in place. I watched in agony as my father formed strange signs with his hands and a demonic specter formed behind him, ready for blood. I listened, enraptured, to my parents last words, determined to remember them for the rest of my measly second life at the least. The rest of my existence at the longest. I listened as my mother spoke, "Jikana, Naruto," she made sure to look at me as she said the first name, and at Naruto as she said the second, as if babies would be able to understand the meaning behind the gesture. I did, and easily, but I was a not a normal child, but I guess she did already know that. " .. Don't be picky.. Eat lots and grow strong.. Make sure that you bathe every day and stay warm.. Also.. Don't stay up late.. You need lots of sleep.. And make friends.. You don't need a lot of friends, just a few.. Ones you can really, really trust.. I wasn't very good at it, but keep up with your studies and practice your ninjutsu hard.. Remember that everyone has strengths and weaknesses.. So don't get too depressed if you can't do something well.. Respect your teachers and upperclassmen at the Academy.. Oh, and this is important.. It's about the Three Prohibitions for a shinobi.. Be extra careful about lending and borrowing money.. Put your mission wages into your savings account.. No alcohol until you're twenty.. Too much can ruin your health, so drink in moderation.. Another Prohibition is women.. I'm a woman, so I don't know too much about this but.. All you need to remember is that this world is made up of men and women.. So it's only natural to take an interest in girls.. But just don't get hooked on bad women.. Find someone just like me.." Okay…? That's kind of narcissistic and creepy. "Speaking of the Three Prohibitions, be wary of Jiraiya Sensei, you know.. Jikana, Naruto, from now on, you're going to face lots of pain and hardship.. Be true to yourself.. Have a dream and have the confidence to make that dream come true.. There's so much.. Oh, so much more that I want to pass on to you.. I wish I could stay with you longer.. I love you." As she finished her speech I looked to my father, who just nodded as he placed his hands together in another strange configuration and yelled "Activate!" The effect was instantaneous, and shocking, not what I had expected at all. I watched as the beast became a translucent ball of energy, split in half, and shot into Naruto and I. I looked on at the events, with a calm aura as my tears dried out, as twin tattoos appeared on our stomach's, as an old man followed by several others in masks, with colorful stripes in patterns to represent animals showed up just in time to catch our names. I watched in anguish as my two new parents died in front of me, I watched this moment, this moment that changed my life forever. It was the first time I had watched somebody die, and it also promised to give Naruto and I great pain in the future.

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 **Three years later**

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In three years I have come to realize how incredibly fortunate I was in my other life. Technology was extremely advanced, my life was explicitly easy, I was graced with good parents and outstanding friends. I became too caught up in my self-pity and depression to realize that I was not an unlucky human being as I had believed myself to be.

The same can not, in any way, be said for my new life. My brother and I were the most hated, distrusted, and abused pair in all of Konoha. Everyone blamed us for the kyuubi's attack, for their leaders, and our **fathers** death. That brought me to the one supremely apparent similarity between this world and my original one. The repeated stupidity of the human race, their unadulterated inability to tell the difference between two simple things: demon and child, lungs and air, glass and water. They were disgustingly idiotic. Only four people in all of the village were not overly hostile towards me: Naruto, Hiruzen, and the Ichiraku's. Unlike Naruto, I could remember all of the hatred and abuse directed at us. Kicked out of the first orphanage after six months of being underfed and abused. The second four months after that, third and fourth in rapid succession subsequently. Then, none of them would allow us to stay for more than two weeks. All of them the same, treating us like they would a spider, as vermin infesting their home, requiring eradication. After we went through almost all of konoha's orphanage's Hiruzen allowed us to reside inside of our own apartment, which he paid for, along with all the expenses that are considered necessary for living.

We endured our first beating at one and a half. We endured, didn't resist with deadly force. The thought didn't cross Naruto's innocent little mind, and I saw no need, it would cause us more trouble than it was worth if we were found out. None of our attackers had made a move to indelibly deal with the 'demon' problem. That is, until we were nearly three years of age. A prowler pulled a knife on Naruto, which is where we found ourselves today, in an alley, late at night, no one else to be seen. I knew that if I did not respond with deadly force we both would indisputably die so, I pulled out my own, albeit stolen, knife and lunged, easily penetrating the man's left ribcage, straight into his heart, undoubtedly killing the man. Blood flew everywhere, soaking the entirety of my arms and most of my front side. Naruto watched in horror as I ensured the execution, yanking my knife out and stabbing through the man's neck, right behind his trachea, and twisting, popping his adam's apple out of his body. The man collapsed onto the gravelly asphalt of the alleyway, he was dead in seconds.

My first kill was not regretted, the action saved Naruto's life, as well as mine. As they say: an eye for an eye, a life for life. I held no regrets, I would kill again, and again, and again. I would end up killing far more than I had ever envisioned, far earlier than I thought possible. That night, a killer was born. That night, a ruthless, cold, and unforgiving murderer was concocted.

After I made the kill Naruto, on the double, turned around and vomited all over the alleyway, turning away from the carcass of the man that I just terminated, thoroughly repulsed by it. I sauntered over to the slain man and quickly snatched up his knife. Holding it out to Naruto, I looked into his eyes, and he looked into mine. That moment, an unarticulated agreement passed between us. We would survive. No matter the cost, we would prevail. Despite my apathy, his empathy, my detestation, his love, my contempt, his acceptance, despite it all, we would survive. And we would survive together. In that moment we formed an unbreakable bond, far deeper than any of the somewhat shallow relationships I had in my previous life, far deeper than the bond between siblings. This bond was formed from the shared agony of two extremely ill-fated individuals, the strongest bond there could be, a bond of mutual understanding, a bond between warriors, a bond beyond death. That night was the birth of more than a cold blooded murderer, it was the birth of a soldier of understanding, a soldier so full of love, that they cried when enemies fell. A warrior whose greatness relied on emotion.

This night forged two people, seemingly polar opposites, one an unforgiving murderer, a genius in combat. The other the kindest soul to ever grace this world, a genius in leadership and camaraderie. That night forged an unstoppable pair, an unparalleled duo, an unrivaled duet. These two souls would continue on and accomplish many, many great triumphs, some always thought to be impossible by the world, in due time, they would become legends.

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 **One year later - Four years old**

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It had been one year since that fateful day had passed, since the day I became a killer, that day changed me more than I would like to admit. Taking that man's life, even though I knew it was the right choice, made me feel horrible. I would do it again if given the choice, but I was undeniably disgusted with what I had done. I do not see this as a sign of weakness, I see it as a sign of sanity. Sanity that I thought I had lost, or was at least on the verge losing. Sanity was indeed a very good thing to retain. I was disgusted with myself for killing that man, but I did not berate myself, depose myself, or become depressed. No, I was glad. I was glad because I knew that as long as I kept that feeling, as long as I did not kill needlessly or without any form of regret that I could, at the very least keep a sliver of my sanity.

I have not wasted my time. During the four years of my second life I have accomplished much. My first milestone was becoming fluent in both the written and spoken languages of this world, it took me approximately two years after my birth. My second goal was to analyze many of the aspects of this world, I have investigated many things, reading all kinds of books: history books, technology books, which were not very advanced, and most importantly, also most interestingly, books on the shinobi arts. I discovered all about the five great nations and their hidden ninja villages. I investigated the arts of ninjutsu, genjutsu, taijutsu, and fuinjutsu, but sadly, was unable to find any scrolls or books telling me how to actually perform any of them, not even a simple taijutsu style. So, in a last ditch effort of learning the enthralling practices, I resorted to closely inspecting the seals on Naruto and I's stomach's. This was a complete failure. My understanding of fuinjutsu did not expand an inch from the attempts. The seals were incredibly intricate and obviously did much more than contain the demon fox, but I was unsure of what the other aspects were.

It was after almost one year of researching, which was undoubtedly noticed by many of the shinobi in the village, including the Hokage. It was after the research that I decided it was time to condition my body. I consider myself lazy, but in an odd way, which may insult many people that are actually, truly lazy. But, nonetheless, I consider myself lazy in the form of only doing what I decide is important or entertaining. In my previous life, I would do all required schoolwork, but no more, I would do the minimal amount of exercise needed to remain in good health, but no more, sometimes even less. I do not consider myself incredibly lazy, but I do consider myself incredibly picky on what I spend my time doing. That is the difference.

So, when I finished the final book from the latest batch that I had 'checked out' from the library, only to find that all of the information was just a reworded interpretation of the information from books that I had previously obtained, I knew that I had learned enough. It was time to begin my physical training. I decided very early on that I would join the ninja academy, as soon as I knew that there was magic in this world, I wanted it. I discovered very quickly that the easiest way to get it was to enroll into the ninja academy of any hidden village, so I had read up on the standards and requirements of joining.

I looked at the small digital clock on the back wall of our shoddy apartment and read the glowing, red symbols that were telling me the time was 11:26 P.M. I smiled a small, pitiful excuse of a smile as I recalled my second mother's final speech to us about how we should try to live our lives to the fullest and take good care of ourselves, however, all of her wishes were discarded or became impossible to follow when we began our horrible adventure of life. I set my book down on top of a pile of about 4 other, similar looking pieces, all bearing the same basic format, boring, minimalistic, informative. I slowly stood from the rickety plastic chair that I was seated on. I rose to my full height, which was not very tall, now realizing how tired I really was. I stretched and yawned before heading off to the bathroom of the house, noticing that my brother was already peacefully snoozing on his mat as I passed through our shared bedroom. I entered the bathroom and took a good, long look into the mirror. Inspecting every detail of my body, every miniscule difference. I wondered how long it would take for me to actually get used to looking how I did, if I ever would. Almost everything was different on this body. Long, spiky, blood red hair, not the smooth brown locks I originally possessed. Dark, lapis eyes in place of the greenish brown hazel ones I was so fond of. Two whisker-like marks on each cheek, just like my 'brothers' except missing the bottom line. Tiny nose, sharp chin, large and almost protruding canines. The one obvious similarity was that I was a scrawny and bony kid, this time it might not have been my genes though, it may have been lack of a nutritional diet. It was impossible for us to get all the food we needed. I didn't have those two moles on my right shoulder, or the big one on my left foot, I didn't have those tiny white dots in the center of my pupils that were seemingly useless, didn't have that scar on my calf. But, despite all of this I was still myself, I still had the same psych, still was an overly logical sarcastic brat.

I forcibly replaced those thoughts with new ones, which is actually very hard for me. My brain never slows down, never stops working, always homes in towards the most interesting thought that it can think about at any point in time. I have to repeatedly replace thoughts with new ones to even hope about distracting myself, and even then, it usually doesn't work. This also can make it difficult to fall asleep, or to concentrate on what I am supposed to. It helps to always be thinking of solutions, but can also be extremely annoying. I believe that everyone can sympathize and agree with me on that statement.

I began to quickly go through my normal rituals for the night, not bothering to change my clothes. I collapsed onto my mat, right next to the form of my sleeping twin and later exited the realm of consciousness.

I awoke to a chilly wind blowing through the room, signifying an open window, a telltale sign of Naruto leaving to execute another one of his 'masterful' pranks. I opened my eyes groaned, and hoped beyond hope that when I turned around to look at my brother, he would be there, sleeping peacefully. I slowly rolled over, all dreams crushed as I viewed the mat next to me, devoid of life. _This_ was a sign that Naruto would be receiving payback soon, not too soon, I want him to think he's escaped, when in reality, he hasn't. I grudgingly got up, waltzed over to the open window, and slammed it shut with all of my might, all the while cursing the little fucker that left the window open, indirectly waking me from my slumber. Groggily, I went through all of my morning routine, ended by eating a simple breakfast consisting of cereal and orange juice.

After an hour or two of not doing anything productive at all, other than allowing my brain to wake up. I came to the conclusion that now was as good a time as any to begin P.T., also known as physical training. I went outside, and although it caused me great, great pains to bring myself to perform this excellent form of torture, I ran. I ran with no set destination, so I just went in a straight line, making it impossible to become lost in the streets, which is something that I seemed to have an incredible aptitude for. I ran, 30 minutes out, 30 minutes back, I luckily did not encounter any type of interference during my run, quite possibly due to the fact that all were in an outward state of indefinite shock from the sight of the painted Hokage monument. All of the Hokage's had been graced with mustaches and sunglasses, some even getting a bonus of snot. It was undoubtedly the work of my twin.

After my morning cardio exercise, I ate lunch at Ichiraku's ramen stand, which is where I met up with naruto, who had managed to avoid ANBU all morning. Ramen was one of the few things that Naruto and I could undoubtedly, unequivocally, agree on. Noodles such as ramen and udon were certainly the food on the gods, without a doubt the best food to ever be gifted to humanity. Our lunch was cut extremely short when a squad of ANBU appeared outside of the food stand, forcing us to scatter or get caught, and then be forced to clean up whatever heinous acts Naruto had committed recently. It really was a tragedy. It's absolutely terrifying when you're constantly being hunted by the 'elite shinobi prank buster squad.' Horrible, absolutely horrible, especially in Naruto's mind. The ANBU opted to chase after Naruto, because he was the one to perform the prank.

Meanwhile, I went back to our apartment and moved on to muscular strength and endurance exercises. I quickly realized that my muscles were much, much weaker than I had originally thought. I thought that because of all of my forced help as a cleaner boy, and loads of experience fleeing from civilians, I would have considerably stronger muscles. I was proven wrong by the fact that I could only force out a measly seventeen pushups. Pathetic, but I suppose that I am in the body of a four year old child and would probably appear totally ridiculous to anyone that was watching these events unfold, not that anybody was. On that note, this was the exact scene that one Sarutobi Hiruzen walked in on. The four year old Uzumaki-Namikaze Jikana struggling to squeeze out as many pushups as possible. Of course, being the sneaky bastard that he was, he did not say a word. He just watched as the struggling child moved between many different muscular workouts. Only after the young whiskered redhead completed ripping apart every single important muscle in his body did the man make himself known.

"That's quite the intense schedule you have there, Jikana-kun" Came the completely unexpected voice of the Third Hokage, so shocking to me that I jumped up, with renewed strength, at least a full foot into the air. Causing me to hit my head on an exceptionally low light fixture located in the center of our bedroom, which consisted of nothing except two dingy sleeping mats, one shared wardrobe, and an extremely small closet. As I lay on the floor clutching my now wounded head, thanking god that I heal so fast in this world, all Hiruzen does is laugh at my pain. Sick bastard. Following his sinister chuckles, Hiruzen spoke once more "Care to explain the reason for your newly found hobby?"

The reply came quickly and straight to the point, simplified into a single word. "Academy." "Oh? You wish to join the academy? With Naruto I presume?" Again, a one word answer "Yes." Hiruzen acted surprised as he began talking again. "How strange! I was thinking about your enrollment in the academy earlier today!" Of course, he was not surprised in the slightest. After all, Naruto was constantly screaming about his dream in life, to become Hokage and disprove all of the insults and assumptions that the villagers made about him and his brother. And even if the children did not want to become shinobi, the shinobi council would undeniably force the two Jinchuuriki into the profession against their will. Hiruzen also knew that even if the child in front of him was not a demon container, he would certainly have become a shinobi. The child was a genius, basic speech since birth, complicated sentences and full comprehension of the spoken language after one year, able to read and write the year after that. The child would most definitely become an excellent ninja, he was already on the path of a prodigy.

"So, Jikana, do you happen to know where Naruto is?"

"Nope, not a cl-" THUD CRASH BANG! Jikana was cut off by a very loud series of crashes and thuds, the sounds of a very clumsy Naruto knocking everything in his path of destruction over, wreaking havoc through the whole kitchen.

"Kitchen." Came the curt response that only assisted in throwing Hiruzen into a fit of chuckles.

His chuckling carried throughout the whole house, and was responded to by an immediate end to the thuds and clangs, followed by an apprehensive "...oh shit."

* * *

Uzumaki Naruto awoke with a sudden rush of energy, a surge of vigor. He flew out of his 'bed', and went straight to the window, not bothering to eat or prepare for the day in any way. He carelessly tossed open the window and did not bother to close it. He rushed outside, went straight to his super secret paint stash and immediately began spraying and/or brushing everything in sight with horrible bright neon shades. His personal favorite and most used being orange. Paint flew, civilians screamed in agony at the spontaneous bleeding of their eyeballs, and a select few shinobi snickered. A very select few.

However amazingly entertaining naruto's vandalism was, it did get old eventually. Run around, paint this, paint that, run around, repeat, repeat, repeat. Uzumaki Naruto, for possibly the first time in his life, was beginning to get bored. And that is when he was struck with an absolutely brilliant idea. The hokage monument. It was the perfect prey. Large, unvandalized, famous, visible. Everything he ever wanted, it was like it was begging to be vandalized. He couldn't resist, he went up there and started painting that baby, going wild, splatters, sunglasses, moustaches, and his personal favorite: a snot dribble on the third Hokage. It was when he was completing this amazing piece of art that they came. Masked horrors, terrifying, dreadful creatures known as ANBU. All hopes and dreams were crushed, all fun was stolen by these monsters.

Paint forgotten, fun abandoned, and all plans now cancelled Naruto ran, and he ran fast. He ran for his soul, for his life. He knew that if those abominations got him, he would be no more. Pathways were ignored, Naruto jumped. He jumped right off of that mountain, and he knew, that moment of terror, that horrifying fall, all that shit. It was worth it. That is how horrified he was of ANBU, in his mind, they were the fucking devil, coming to punish him for his sins. Some thought it was impressive that he could constantly avoid ANBU, prodigious even. They knew little. They did not know that the only reason he could possibly outrun those fuckers, was that he actually thought that his life depended on it.

As soon as he landed, he bolted, which is incredibly impressive considering the fact that he just jumped off of a mountain. He didn't even stop to think twice before proceeding with his escape. He ran at least 15 blocks before turning into an alleyway and hiding for the better part of an hour. At this point it was nearing lunchtime, so he decided to go to ichiraku's ramen, as always. He was lucky enough to run into his twin brother, but also unlucky enough to cross the path of ANBU once again, ruining his meal as he was forced to flee, only to once again avoid capture, go into hiding, and then head home. All in all, a very average day in the life of Uzumaki Naruto.

* * *

Hiruzen Sarutobi was listening intently to a chuunin worker in the Hokage Tower as he reported about one Uzumaki Naruto, who had managed to avoid ANBU. Twice. In one day. An impressive feat, to say the least. Hiruzen wished that the circumstances surrounding the Uzumaki children were different, but alas, they were certainly unchangeable. Hiruzen knew that if the two were not so hated and mistreated they would certainly be prodigies, maybe even enrolled in the academy by now. Naruto with his charismatic personality and steadfast determination, Jikana with his incredible intellect and brutal efficiency. The third smiled a sad smile at that thought, now matter how secretive and smart the boys had been about hiding that man's dead body, covering all of their tracks, the third knew what had happened that night. He had watched the whole thing through his crystal ball, it was impossible to get ninja there before Jikana plunged his knife into the man, it had escalated extremely quickly. Despite this, Hiruzen knew the council would not allow the boys early entry into the academy, under any circumstances. The civilian council believed that the children should not ever be allowed to become shinobi, or even be allowed to live. This forced the shinobi side of the council to compromise and limit the boy's rights quite intensely.

* * *

Naruto stealthily crept his way to his kitchen window, slowly opening it, hoping to get the jump on his brother. His plans were soon destroyed, which seemed to be a reoccurring theme today, as his shoelace got snagged on a protruding screw top on his windowsill, effectively tripping him and causing him to fall face first into the drying rack full of dishes. Naruto's face was in incredible pain as his cover was destroyed. As if that wasn't enough, his shoelace refused to get unstuck, causing him to flail around until his shoe suddenly came off of his foot. This caused him to once again, fall face first into this time, his dining table. It was at this moment that he heard a deep chuckle resound through his home, which could only mean one person, the Hokage. In his mind, this could only mean one thing: more ANBU. It was at this moment that Uzumaki Naruto knew: he fucked up.

He said two words, two words filled to the brim with all the regret he had in him. He muttered these words " ...oh shit." This caused the chucking to evolve into laughter as the Third Hokage came out of the bedroom, trailed by his impassive brother, Jikana. The Hokage leaned forward and whispered, so only Naruto could hear "Found you." Naruto screamed, got up, turned around, and started to run. His attempts at escape were cut short when his shirt refused to move with him. Gulping, he turned around to see the smiling face of Hiruzen Sarutobi and hear his gravelly voice. "Now, now Na-ru-to-Kuuuun where do you think you're going? And where did you learn that nasty word?" Wisely ignoring Hiruzen's questions, Naruto pleadingly turned towards his brother and whimpered "bro?... Brother? Nii-san? Nii… sama?" In monotone Jikana replied with "Naruto, my dearest brother," This was bad. Naruto knew his brother, and he was not one to draw things out or sugar coat them. When he did it spelled certain doom. "In your haste this morning, you forgot one crucial action... that is, to always, always close the bedroom window." By now, Jikana had a shit-eating grin as he watched Naruto's expression of hope and pleading morph into one of absolute horror and understanding. He said one word, one word that fit perfectly into this situation that he had found himself in. "Fuck." Jikana couldn't help it, he laughed.

* * *

 **AN: That is nowhere near what I had expected out of this chapter. I had decided the approximate length at the beginning, as well as having a couple of markers to pass but this chapter, is nothing like I thought it was gonna be. It's longer than I had thought, and much better than what I had hoped for. I can say that I was pleasantly suprised.**


	3. Enrollment

**AN: Early academy! Thanks for all reviews, follows, and faves. This chapter is a bit slow, as well as small. I was planning on releasing a longer version by today or tomorrow, but I had plane flights and band things and other stuff, so it's a bit short. And now, I am releasing it early because I am going on a multi-day trip where I will not be able to write at all! Hopefully after school starts back again I'll have a more stable schedule and and be able to write more consistently. Have fun and read!**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto**

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Chapter 3: _Enrollment_

* * *

 **6 years old**

* * *

School. Oh, how I hated school. Everything about it, the work, the children, even most of the teachers. In my mind there was nothing exciting about school, but I knew it was a necessity to become a productive citizen and make a living. This did not diminish my hatred, not even a bit. I especially hated it when I already knew the material that we were learning, it was infuriating. I saw these days as a waste of my time, just letting me grow older without actually progressing any part of my being.

These were my thoughts as I was sitting in the back row of the tiered classroom on the first day of the ninja academy. The layout of the room reminded me of my junior high band room, and I liked rooms with tiered layouts like this. My band instructor did not. Meanwhile, I was seated next to some kid with sunglasses, a hooded jacket, and a shirt with a ridiculously high collar. He looked like the quietest other kid in the whole room, a respectable trait. I liked the hoodie as well, certainly my kind of guy. Naruto was on the other side of me, snoring loudly and still donning that god awful orange jumpsuit. I, on the other hand, was wearing a much better outfit that was gifted to me from the Hokage. A black, loose, long sleeved shirt that was ingrained with ninja wire to maximize durability, as well as defense. This was paired with thick black cargo pants that were also made with trace amounts of ninja wire. The pockets were designed to be able to hold all of your ninja supplies. They also came with three hoops on the upper left thigh to hold standard sized scrolls. Most of the pockets were empty as I only had the fundamental supplies like kunai and shuriken. The outfit was completed with simple black combat boots.

Back to school, I was bored out of my mind. I already knew all of the material, and it appeared that I was not the only one. I spotted a pineapple in the lower rows looking extremely bored and on the verge of sleep. Either he knew this stuff or was just extremely lazy., maybe both. The chuunin instructor was at the front of the class finishing telling us what chakra was, he was also impressively successfully ignoring Naruto's snoring. The moment he turned towards the class and asked if there were any questions and over half of the classes hands shot up into the air I knew that the academy was going to be an extremely long and tedious adventure.

* * *

Aburame Shino was intrigued. He had went into the ninja academy feeling normal, maybe a bit excited even. He had arrived early, one of the first ones to arrive, in fact. This was because he wanted to have the ability to get familiar with the place he would be spending the next six years of his life in, as well and investigating his future comrades. He took a seat in the back row. As the starting time of class drew near he was beginning to believe that he would be all by his lonesome for the rest of the day. He was broken out of his thoughts as he watched an interesting pair enter the classroom. They were obviously siblings, both of their heads were filled with spikes of hair and, most interestingly they both appeared to have whiskers. One of them had blindingly bright blonde locks, along with three whisker like marks on each cheek. The other had a long and fierce deep red mane coupled with a pair of whiskers, all adding to an interesting and intense form.

The redhead quickly scanned the room until his gaze landed on Shino, he kept staring as he walked right up to the bug-man, which was quite unnerving. He then turned and groaned loudly as he slowly sat down, acting as if he was incredibly tired and sore, much to the amusement of the class around them. He seemed oblivious to that fact and just sat down without saying a word. The chuunin instructor entered the classroom soon after, introducing himself as Umino Iruka. Shortly after he made each of the students introduce themselves by giving their names and their most useful skill. When it was Shino's turn he introduced himself in a very normal way "Hello, my name is Shino Aburame. My most useful skill is being able to communicate and cooperate with my combat beetles." When he finished, he looked at the redhead sitting next to him as he did his introduction "Uzumaki Jikana, thinking." only to be disappointed by his overly simplified response. He heard his brother go on and say his name and something about ramen. Shino was not really listening to the blond as he ranted about _all_ of his skills. He was busy thinking about Jikana's short, but surprisingly informative introduction. He knew that many of the children in the room would think that his answer was idiotic, but being a clan heir had its perks. One of these perks was increased mental stimulation during younger years. Shino was no genius, but from that introduction he knew that Jikana was smart, and secretive. Even though thinking couldn't really be considered a skill, it was undeniably the most useful thing to have in life. Shino stole a glance at the child just in time to see him visibly deflate when the teacher announced their schedule for today. Shino turned back towards the front of the classroom to listen to the chuunin instructor. He would wait until lunchtime to try to learn more about the mystery child.

* * *

Nara Shikamaru was bored, as per usual. He did not come to school excited, for good reason too. All of the information that was given during the beginning months of the academy was extremely simple. Shikamaru had already learned most of the stuff that was being taught by his troublesome instructor from before the academy. He was not expecting much from today. His new sensei seemed pleased to meet his expectations. The moment after he introduced himself with a short "Nara Shikamaru, my clan's shadow jutsu." he lay his head down on his arms and tried to go to sleep, ignoring the rest of his peers versions of introduction. He was eventually successful in his difficult endeavor of sleep, only to be awoken soon after by the shrill ringing of the academy bell, signifying lunch.

He was more than happy to give in to the wishes of the lunch bell and leave the classroom to eat his lunch, hopefully in peace. Shikamaru went up to the roof with his friend Choji, he thought that the roof would be the quietest place to eat and that no one else would even think to go up there. An added bonus was the good view of the clouds. Sadly, he was wrong on two of his assumptions. He went up to the roof only to find it inhabited by three people already. He saw three locks of spiky hair on the roof. One brown, One blond, and one red. Uninterested, he proceeded to move to the opposite side of the roof to try to get some peace and quiet. However, he was stopped when away excited voice called out "Hey pineapple! Wanna eat with us?"

Pineapple turned around to see the blond smiling, looking at him expectantly. He was obviously the culprit of the noise. He inspected the other two sitting next to them, seeing the Aburame clan heir Shino, looking as stoic as ever. He also spotted a kid with vibrant red hair, his face in his palm, looking exasperated. "Why pineapple?" Shikamaru asked.

"It's what my brother called you, something about your hair." He motioned towards the redhead.

"Ahh"

"So, wanna eat lunch together?" The blond was insistent.

"Hm, troublesome" Came Shikamaru's, or pineapple's reply as he walked towards the small group while being trailed by Choji.

He and Choji joined the group, exchanged names and began silently eating as the blond, now known to be Naruto, was spewing out droves of words, not slowing down or giving any hints of slowing anytime before lunch ended. Choji would occasionally say something and Jikana would just grunt in acknowledgement. Shino and Shikamaru were completely silent unless directly spoken to. This continued on until the end of lunchtime.

* * *

The first day at the academy had ended after what had seemed like days. Jikana came out of the building without a scrap of new information. The whole day was spent discussing extremely basic things, like what chakra and ninjutsu are, things like that. Iruka gave a few simple examples of each type of jutsu as well. All in all, incredibly boring. Naruto and I gave Ichiraku's a quick visit for dinner and headed home, having nothing else to do. Once inside of our dingy apartment we began conversing about our day at the academy, which seemed useless to me, we did spend the whole day together. I felt that all information that I could give was obvious and easily obtainable without dialogue. Naruto felt differently. "Hey bro, why were you so quiet all day today? You were acting so different, like you do when we are on the streets. Why's that?" Naruto asked.

"Why do you think I act that way when we're outside?" The reply was a question, much to the Ire of Naruto.

He responded "I don't know! You're weird!"

"And why doesn't my weirdness apply to my actions during the academy?" Another question.

"Arrgh! Why do you have to ask so many questions? Just give me a straight answer dammit!" He screamed.

"Fine fine." I submitted. "I act that way so I don't make a fool of myself. I only act differently around you because I know and trust you."

"Well that's a stupid reason! You're much more fun at home! You're always singing like oob-be dop a-boo bop. doo-bee da! And doing that thing with your hands!" He shouted back.

I chuckled "Not quite, it's more like this: Adoo ba. adoo ba. adoo ba doodoo." 'Slaps drum fill on the counter' "UhhBa! Uhba! Uh daba da daaa. Yeah!"

"Yes, that! And the dances." I cringed. "Oh! Also those funny noises you say sometimes." I stared. "You know, like _Fuck! Ya goddamn motherfucking motherfucker!"_ He meant English. "Though those one are usually when you're hurt or mad… still though! Loads better than how you were today!."

"Maybe in your mind. I, on the other hand would like to not instantly repel all people that I come into contact with."

"If they don't accept who you really are why would you even want to talk to them?!" Shouted Naruto.

"All but one person that I know have different public personas, it's normal."

"What! How is that possible? How will you ever get to know anyone if they're all fake?!" He exclaimed.

I answered, "People take time to get to know and understand, as you get more comfortable with each other things will start to slip through unconsciously and eventually you will not be hiding anything."

"Oh. What a funny way of doing things." He said in a confused tone. "Oh, by the way, did you understand any of what our sensei said today?"

"You know, for hating being asked questions, you sure do ask a lot." I stated dryly.

The response came, "Yeah, I guess I do huh? But seriously, did you get any of it?"

My answer, "Yes, all of it actually."

"What! How!"

"It was actually really simple." I recalled the day of torture.

"So… can you help me?" He pleaded.

"Hmmm, I suppose."

* * *

Shino Aburame left the ninja academy satisfied. That's because he had enjoyed the instructions given by his sensei, even if they were relatively simple, and he had made the acquaintance of some very interesting people. He hoped that he would continue to deepen his bonds with them and make new ones as well, that's because he valued bonds above everything else, he also knew that they were important in the life of a ninja, his clan taught him that.

Shino was escorted back to his clan compound by one of his older cousins. The compound was one of the smaller ones in the village, but it was big enough. That's because his clan was not as large as some others. When he entered his home he was surprised to see that his father was there. That is because his dad usually worked much later than when the academy released. His father questioned him about his first day at the academy. He responded by saying "My day was pleasant, that's because I learned from the lectures and met a few new people."

"Who did you meet? I'm curious about who you will be spending the rest of your career with." inquired his father.

"I met a few people, their names were Shikamaru Nara, Akimichi Choji, Uzumaki Naruto, and Uzumaki Jikana. Shikamaru is a very laid back person, that is because he's very lazy. Choji is a bit similar to Shikamaru, that's most likely because they have been friends for years. Naruto is very loud and talkative, I do not know why. Jikana is like the opposite, he is not talkative at all and seems to be very smart."

"Hmm. You should make sure to treat the Uzumaki's well, that's because they did not have the best childhood, they could use some kindness in their lives."

"Okay father. I have to go now, that's because I have homework from the academy to do."

"Very well, I will see you at dinner, Shino."

This was a normal conversation for the Aburame clan heir and head. They had very strange conversations, mostly because they always explained their reasoning behind something. Very useful on a mission, very annoying anytime else.

* * *

Shikamaru felt completely normal. To him, today was just another normal day filled with cloud watching and taking naps, other than lunch of course. His schedule had not changed when he entered the academy. Once the class was released he lazily walked out and waited in front of the school for someone to pick him up. Choji was picked up before him, so he was left to wait in solitude. He sat on a swing and stared at the clouds, thinking about the troublesome blond that he had encountered today, along with his brother. He was also thinking about Shino Aburame, but to a lesser degree. Uzumaki Naruto, energetic, talkative, hyperactive, not the sharpest mind. He seemed to be the embodiment of physical energy. Uzumaki Jikana, extremely quiet, sometimes unresponsive, both were pointers of someone having excess mental energy. Shikamaru would know, after all almost all Nara's were the same way. Below average physical chakra amounts, above average mental chakra amounts. This is why they were all lazy, but smart. Your personality reflected your chakra, or vice-versa, he had no clue which one it really was. Shikamaru was positive that Naruto had high amounts of physical chakra and low amounts of the opposite. He assumed that Jikana was the reverse but he could not tell if Jikana had less physical energy than an average person, or if he just had a ridiculous amount of mental energy. The boy didn't seem inherently lazy, nor did he seem very proactive. Shikamaru knew that with personalities that extreme, both of them would be tremendously troublesome. He looked up, breaking himself out of his thoughts as he heard nearly silent footsteps approach him. He saw that the footsteps belonged to his mother and got up from his mount to follow her to the Nara compound. On the walk there she asked "How was your first day at the academy Shika?"

She already knew the answer "Troublesome."

"Figures."

And that was the extent of that conversation, it also ended the first day of the new year of academy students. Bonds had begun to form and would not stop progressing. This year was meant for great things. Eight clan heirs, if you counted the heirs to the Namikaze and Uzumaki clans. The only clan child that was not an heir was Kiba, that was his big sisters title. Poor Kiba, sucks being the odd one out.

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 **AN: Again, very short and also very slow. Next chapter will be longer for sure. Fave, follow, review, whatever floats your boat. Be back next chapter.**


	4. The Bulk of it

**AN: O Mah Gawd. Holy schedule. Jesus Christ, I just got done with my first week of school this year, and let me tell you, free time went down the drain. Marching band every day, homework every day, no free time at all. It was bad. No writing happened at all. So, you can be expecting a lot more infrequent updates than once or twice a week. I know that sophomores in highschool don't have the worst workload, it's actually probably pretty good so I shouldn't complain. But I will, and I have. So sorry.**

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Chapter 4: _The bulk of it_

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That was the final straw. I refuse to accept anymore academic sabotage, it has gone too far. The moment he said that, I was conclusively confident that something _had_ to be done. My anger is justified, no one deserves what I have experienced. The current standings of students had just been released; Naruto and I were the bottom two, I know, big surprise. I was just a smidgen above Naruto on the scoreboard. This by itself is not upsetting, I had assumed that the instructors would try something like this. What I had not expected was what Naruto had said to me. After he looked at the scores he turned to me on the double and said "Hey, you're pretty dumb, aren't you?" That's what he said. That's what _Naruto,_ the biggest idiot that I know, said to _me._ I had tried to explain to him that that was not the case and that the scores had to be wrong, I even pointed out that his scores were worse than mine. He would have none of it. He just said "It's not my fault that my scores are so low. You taught me." As if that explained everything. I was livid. I was livid and knew that something had to be done to solve this atrocity.

When the lunch bell rang I told the group that I would meet them on the roof later. I waited until all other students had filed out of the classroom and went up to one of the rare human beings that didn't treat my brother and I like less than dirt. Our chuunin instructor, Umino Iruka.

"Iruka-Sensei."

He looked up from the papers he had launched himself into the moment the bell had rung. "Yes? What do you want?"

"I want to request that no one except you grades Naruto and I's work." I informed him.

He looked surprised at my request. "Why would I do that?"

"Because you are the only instructor that I have met so far that treats Naruto and I like people." I answered.

"So," he looked confused as he spoke, "how does that make me more suitable for grading you?"

"You won't sabotage it."

His eyebrows rose in understanding. " I see, just make sure to hand everything in to me instead of in the basket and I'll do it."

"K, thanks." That was much easier than expected. Even though I knew he wouldn't take the effort to sabotage us, I didn't think he would make an effort to help us either. I had assumed that he simply didn't care about what happened to us either way. I guess sometimes the world can give you pleasant surprises.

Breaking out of my thoughts on Iruka, I promptly exited the classroom and went up to the roof. I discovered that my friends had found a replacement. Sitting in my usual spot was another child, a brunette with red tatoo's on his cheeks in the form of fangs. If I remember correctly his name was Kiba Inuzuka, the second child of the Inuzuka clan head. He was loud and brash, a common trait among his clan. I walked up to the group and sat down in a random open area. Kiba gave me his name, which I had surprisingly remembered correctly. I never had a good memory, especially about things I don't care about. An example being some random dudes name. Maybe my memory had improved when I was reborn. Anyways, I introduced myself and sat down next to Shikamaru, who was sitting at the edge of our half circle formation. As I ate I let my thoughts wander. They decided to wander to the topic of chakra, turns out it would be a long while before we would begin to learn how to mold our chakra. It would be even longer before we would be allowed to perform ninjutsu. To be precise, everyone that hasn't already would unlock their chakra in eight or so months and shortly after we would begin our first chakra control exercise. Six months after getting used to having chakra, we would learn ninjutsu. I did not want to wait. I hypothesized that my brother and I had unlocked our chakra at an extremely young age. When the kyuubi, an entity compiled completely out of chakra, was forced into our bodies. All I needed was to learn how to mold chakra. This would be very difficult for me, because I had already gone through over two decades of total life without having any experience of ever successfully molding chakra. I had tried, but with no success. These thoughts plagued my mind for the remainder of the day, and would continue to irk me until I was able to figure out this whole chakra thing. More specifically, until I got help from the academy.

* * *

I was excited. Surprising, I know. But I had a good reason, and that reason was spars. That's right, after many many months of doing nothing but just learning about basic ninja skills, we got to put them to the test. I knew, or thought at least, that I had the skill to take down six year olds. Even if I was a six year old myself, I knew I had got this one in the bag. These were my thoughts as I walked into the arena to face off against some Uchiha kid, he was going down alright.

We waited for Iruka's signal to start, not a movement.

"Begin!"

No one moved. I was expecting him to try to charge me, it seemed like the trend today. Well, whatever, I could wait.

So I waited, and waited. I waited for about ten minutes. It was cool, I guess. I mean I gotta stand there, just looking at the dudes ugly mug. Not really a problem for me. Iruka, however, did not think it was cool. A damn shame, but, what can you expect? We had already taken more time than everyone else, and we hadn't even moved. Iruka, in his impatient ways, told us "If no one moves in the next ten seconds you both will receive a loss." Okay. Don't care, I'm already pretty much at the bottom from the beginning sabotage. I could care less if I lost or not. Sasuke felt differently. He heard that and then joined the rest of the class and charged head first. Didn't see that one coming.

Sasuke came at me with a straight thrust, which I aptly sidestepped my way out of. I countered while he was recovering from the lack of expected impact. I quickly stepped on one of his feet and shoved him, a very graceful move indeed, he stumbled forward, barely managing to stop himself without exiting the fighting ring. He hastily spun around, only to find out that I was already lunging. He managed to deflect my strike, but to no avail. He deflected my hand, but I kept bulldozing forward towards him. For some odd reason, he seemed to think that what I had done was not possible or taboo. Doesn't matter to me, all that I cared about was that he was not prepared to get rammed. He stumbled backwards a couple of steps, and was outside of the ring.

Sweet victory. Sparring was fun, especially when you win. We did the weird peace symbol thing and walked away, I'm pretty sure that the kid was pretty pissed at me for beating him. His problem. My problem was my continued boredom, this was the only semi interesting thing that had happened to me in a very long while but, life is boring sometimes.

* * *

"Chakra, as we learned earlier this year, is the combination of physical and mental energies. Every individual has different levels of chakra, and the more chakra you have the harder it is to control it efficiently." I was paying rapt attention. "Today we will be unlocking everyone's chakra, finding out how to mold it and how large everyone's chakra pools are. First, we will be unlocking chakra. This process is usually pretty quick, we hardly ever have any problems with this. Now, first up is…" Iruka dragged his finger along the page in front of him. "Sakura! Get down here!" Sakura smirked and stood up. She puffed her chest out and strutted down the path, making a point to give Sasuke a great view. She also glanced at me, as if contemplating what to do. Sasuke and I were neck to neck for the top place currently. I was better at the material, but didn't care that much. As long as I graduated I was fine. On the other hand, he deeply craved the title of rookie of the year. Even though we were constantly flip flopping for first place he got all of the attention. I correctly assumed that this was due to the hatred for the nine-tails being passed down the generations.

Sakura reached the front of the classroom and Iruka fastened some sort of device to her arm. "Okay class, this device is designed to read whether or not someone has chakra running through their system. Most people unlock their chakra in stressful moments of life by the age of eight however, there are alternative ways to unlock it. Sakura, it appears that your chakra is still locked. I want you to try to concentrate on your stomach area. Try to imagine all of your energy exploding outward from it."

"Yes, sensei" Said Sakura as she gained a look of immense concentration. She stayed that way for a minute or two before Iruka told her that she had unlocked her chakra successfully. People kept on getting called down and most had similar experiences. However, a couple kids, other than the clan children, had already unlocked their chakra. When it was my turn I went to the front and was told that my chakra was unlocked all adding to a very useless and boring experience.

"Okay, now that everyone has unlocked chakra we will begin molding. Everyone has a different trick for how they get their chakra to move, some act like they are beating it down and forcefully control it, others just let it flow by itself imagining that they are giving it guidelines and gentle nudges. There are so many different ways to mold chakra that we could spend months trying to find all of the separate tactics, and not even finish! We do not have the time or reason to do that so I am going to let you all find out your own ways, if you need help just come to me. This piece of paper that I am passing around will glow when you pour chakra into it, the more chakra you put into it the brighter it will glow." I watched the papers cycle around the classroom, eager for when they came to me. When they finally completed their journey through the classroom and onto my desk, I quickly grabbed at one to start experimenting. My first thought of channeling chakra was to 'scoop' some out of my reserves and then expel it outwards. This was not efficient. I scooped then pushed all of the energy into my fingertips. Nothing. Not even a faint glow. I tried over, and over, and over, and over, like monkey with a miniature cymbal. But, it turns out that the joy of repetition would not help me here. As I was brainstorming new ways to mold my chakra, a blinding light exploded from the seat adjacent to mine. I recoiled immediately and shielded my eyes, also making a very high pitched squeal as I turned away. I was not alone, I think I could hear Iruka's voice among the most prominent of the squeals. Meanwhile, I heard frantic screaming coming from Naruto, who was right where the light exploded from. Slowly, cautiously, I turned towards him, discovering that the light had gone away and Naruto was looking at his paper as if it were the devil itself. Iruka spoke up first "It looks like Naruto here has a large chakra capacity… extremely large."

I looked back from the front of the classroom to Naruto who now wore an expression of awe. Wondering out loud I muttered "How did he do it?"

He looked at me, then to the paper, then back at me and said "I… I have no idea."

"Well that's helpful."

"I don't know! I guess it was like uuuuuuuuuUUUUU AAAAAHH!" He had even added in hand motions.

I just stared at him blandly. I wore an unreadable yet perfectly understandable expression. It clearly said: really? Is that really all you have to say for yourself? You should be disappointed. Naruto just looked right back and shrugged. I sighed, how troublesome.

The day was pretty uneventful after that until post-lunch. I had tried out many methods, including Naruto's 'uuu ahh,' my 'pushing' method, 'pulling,' 'flowing', forcing', 'slashing,' and many, many more. None worked. I was beginning to fear that I would be unable to mold my chakra by the end of the day. We only had a measly twenty minutes left of class, after all. I only had the time to try one last method. I imagined a pathways, like rivers and streams, flowing through my body. I opened the gate from my stomach, a lake, to my fingertips, streams flowing into the ocean. The effect was immediate, and painful. Yet again, a blinding light was illuminating the classroom, causing many students, and surprisingly Iruka to start shouting curses, accompanied by the panicked "not again!". I was ecstatic. When I recovered from that blinding glow a smile crept onto my face and I took a hint from Naruto. I jumped out of my seat and shouted, at the top of my lungs, "Yatta!" It was absolutely disgusting.

* * *

After I unlocked my chakra life was pretty boring again, to my ever increasing sadness. I was constantly throwing things around by blasting chakra through my tenketsu; I even tried a shuriken once. Not my brightest idea, I almost killed Iruka's assistant teacher, which was fun. Until I got detention, that is. But other than that things have gone smoothly in the academy. The three basic jutsu were a major letdown, I can understand why we need to learn them and that they could be extremely useful but, I think that they are incredibly lame. They did take me a while, especially the clone jutsu. I shudder just thinking about that one. I kept on trying to put my chakra into three to four clones, like Iruka had told us to. However, when I, or Naruto, tried it the clones came out looking like pale ghosty blob thingies. Not what we were going for. After like three months of continued failures I knew that we were either doing something terribly wrong, or we sucked and were doing something terribly wrong. So, I started thinking about the different things that make jutsu successful. Hand signs, proper amount of chakra, and correct molding of the chakra. I knew that we were doing the hand signs right so, I decided to work on the other two sections. I quickly found out that it was my chakra control. My excessive amount of chakra made it extremely hard to control it minutely enough to perform extremely low ranking jutsu like the clone so, instead of making three clones I decided to make around one hundred. Worked like a charm, now both Naruto and I have no major problems for the graduation test, which was today. Yep, it's been a while.

So, to the test. I've never really had problems with test's. To me, they were exactly like what we did in class everyday except people think that they are more important. Really, if you can't do it by the time the test comes around you should just quit, that might be harsh but, especially in the life of a soldier, it's the truth. Anyways, the first test was a taijutsu spar, which I dominated in if I were to say myself. Iruka would say I was 'average genin level in taijutsu' but, I think that I was stellar. After taijutsu came shuriken and kunai throwing, which I'm gonna be honest with you, is not my strong suit. Even after putting over half of my practice time into this, I couldn't quite get all of them. It was just hard for me to throw things accurately, always has been. In the end I only missed one, a very stark contrast from my hitting one in the beginning of the year, which also resulted in a very terrified assistant teacher and amazing story. There was no standard genjutsu test, no idea why they made it that way, genjutsu could be extremely deadly, especially when used in conjunction with your team, not my decision though. So, no gen, straight to nin. Now, first things first, I do love ninjutsu, it's my favorite thing _ever_. So, I'm going to tell you right now. Ninjutsu is not my forte. No no, that's taijutsu. Ninjutsu is… my fortissimo! Yes, yes indeed. I was called up to the front of that classroom and that Iruka fellow told me, you must perform the clone jutsu to pass this test. He was worried, he'd never seen me make a successful clone before, that was a new development. He had every reason to be worried but, he should have been more worried about his eyes. I was in a pranking mood. Very rare for me, it's happened a total of one whole time. Anyhoo, I went and made around three hundred clones, looked at Naruto, who was in the process of putting on a nice pair of eclipse glasses, looked at Iruka who looked amazed at the sheer number of clones that had been made. I watched as his face changed from awe to horror in a split second as he beheld all of my clones take out a piece of paper; a piece of paper specifically used to measure chakra control and capacity. I put on my sunglasses and observed as the whole class started screaming and begging for mercy. It was blissfully beautiful.

* * *

Mizuki was in state of shock, rage, and worry. Both of the Uzumaki kids had passed the genin exam. This was not a part of his plan at fact, it was in direct contrast to is plan. He would either have to steal that scroll himself, abandon his mission, or try to convince one of them to steal it by some other means. He was liking the sound of the last one. He didn't have clue of how he was going to execute this task, but it was most definitely the most preferred option. Jikana wouldn't be stupid enough to fall for any of his traps so Naruto would need to be alone. He would figure something out, he always did.

Mizuki peered out of the window in in his office, watching all of the newly made genin waltz around in front of the academy building. He had made up his mind. Mizuki got up from his desk and strode down the creaky wooden halls, towards the front exit. He soon located the Uzumaki children and started shadowing them, he would have to wait until the blonde one was alone.

So he did.

He waited for hours, and finally, he was rewarded. The redhead had left, most likely to get some form of celebratory food. That wasn't the important part. The important part was that poor Naruto was all by his lonesome. Mizuki did not waste this chance. He slid next to the door of the Uzumaki childrens abode and knocked. The response was impressively quick, the door slid open, revealing none other than Naruto. He squinted up at Mizuki and questioned him, "Mizuki sensei? What are you doing here?"

Mizuki smiled. "Well, you see, sometimes the academy see's some very special and talented people." He began his lie, "Out of these only a select few some are given an opportunity."

"An opportunity?" Naruto inquired.

"Yes, this is only give to graduates with extreme promise and skill. They will be given a test, and if they pass they will be able to skip D-ranked missions as well as be under constant evaluation for promotion."

"So? What does that mean?" Naruto did not understand.

"It means that you will immediately be considered a high class genin and may get promoted to chuunin very quickly." Mizuki hoped that was simple enough for the idiotic child to understand.

Naruto was exceptionally excited, "Oh! That's cool, did someone get that this year? Was it me!? Was it Jikana?" His excitement dropped considerably when he remembered that Jikana was second from the top in the class.

"No Naruto, it was not Jikana, it was you." Mizuki couldn't help his smirk, he had him. "Your task is to steal the forbidden scroll from the Hokage's office and learn at least one jutsu from it, meet me at our normal training grounds afterwards. Get going."

"Yes, sensei!" Naruto replied before bounding away, towards the Hokage tower.

* * *

Jikana was walking home, in a very good mood. He had just bought some ramen and was heading home to celebrate graduation with Naruto. He was remarkably happy that both of them had graduated the academy. If he hadn't figured out the reason they couldn't perform the clone jutsu, they probably would have had to take another year, which would have been one of the worst things that could have ever happened. He was now nearing his apartment on the fifth floor of his building, and his first suspicion arose. The door was slightly ajar, but he was confident that he had closed it. He had forgotten more important things before so he decided that it was not something that he should think too hard on. However, if there was anything else slightly weird he would know something was up. As Jikana walked inside of his house he called out, "I'm home!" No response. "Naruto, are you here?" Still nothing. Something was definitely wrong, he dashed outside, made a point to close the door and began to frantically search for Naruto. He checked everywhere. The hokage monument, the park, the swing, the forest. Everywhere he knew of that he thought Naruto would run off to. Jikana, beginning to think that Naruto had been captured, perked up immediately when he heard a frantically searching ninja shout something about a stolen scroll. That sounded like something Naruto might do, and he knew where he would go if he did.

The training ground.

Jikana dashed away, confident that he knew where his brother had gone to. As he saw the training ground, which was quite conveniently surrounded by bushes and trees, grow closer he started to speed up. He burst through the surrounding plant life and was graced with the sight of his brother hunched over a scroll, mumbling incoherently. Jikana slowly approached and queried, "what have you gotten there Naruto?"

Naruto's head snapped up towards his brother as he quickly stuttered out "N-n-n-nothing! Nothing at all!"

"It wouldn't happen to be a forbidden scroll would it?"

Naruto sheepishly scratched the back of his head and responded, "You caught me." Well, his innocent act fell pretty quickly.

I strode over to where the scroll was and crouched down next to Naruto, "Yes I did, now which one are you looking at?"

He blinked at me before pointing at a jutsu called the shadow clone jutsu. I skimmed over it, nodded and said, "Good, you keep doing that and I'll take a look at this one." I began to move my finger to point at another jutsu when a third voice made itself known.

"Naruto! Jikana! What do you think you two are doing!?" It was Iruka.

"Let me tell you what the think that they are doing, Iruka. Naruto has been informed that if he learns a jutsu out of that scroll, he will be given special privileges as a genin!" Another voice.

"Mizuki!" Iruka seemed relieved "Who told him that?"

"Oh Iruka, so trusting. You see, the one who told them that was none other than me!" Mizuki snarled.

"What why would you….." A look of understanding dawned on Iruka's face. "Oh, I see."

"That's right Iruka." Mizuki turned towards the children. "And for you, you disgusting brats. Do you know why people hate you so? Why they shun you and call you monsters?" I'm amazed that he hasn't died yet, who give monologues when they just declared themselves an enemy?

"Mizuki no! It's forbidden!" And who does use that advantage?

"Shut up Iruka!" Iruka flinched back "Do your really think I care?" He finished growling at Iruka and looked straight at Naruto and Jikana. "No? Well let me tell you, the reason is because you are the kyuubi!" He pulled out a windmill shuriken. "The fourth could not defeat the beast so instead he put inside of both of you!" He threw.

Jikana was about to dodge when he saw something that he never thought he would ever see. Iruka, his academy teacher threw himself between them and the shuriken. It went all the way through him, most of a blade sticking through his stomach. There was no way he would survive. Mizuki started babbling about something but it was all muted to my ears. I could care less about what he had to say for himself, he had just attempted to kill me, or Naruto. Probably both actually. But, that was beside the point. He had killed Iruka, who was one of the only people in all of konoha that we could talk to without fearing the repercussions of hate in the process. As I walked towards Iruka's limp body I told Naruto to distract Mizuki with his new technique. He happily obliged. I yanked the massive shuriken out of my old teacher's back and improvised. I placed one hand under and one hand over the shuriken, I started pushing chakra out of both of my palms to make the massive weapon float. Then, at the beginning slowly, but with exponentially increasing speed, I started to spin it. The shuriken started making a very loud whirring noise, almost deafening, but I was not done, I pinpointed Mizuki in the midst of all of Naruto's clones and called for the original to retreat back to me. I turned towards him, aimed, then angled my palms out while shooting a massive amount of chakra through them. The effect was immediate and mostly successful. The windmill shuriken shot forward at incredible speeds, shredding through all the clones in it's path and straight to Mizuki. My arms also shot outwards at incredible speeds, most definitely ripping something and most likely dislocating my shoulders. I shouted out a string of curses at the pain that was shooting through both of my upper limbs.

Eventually, looked up, towards the path that the shuriken had taken. Many trees were sawed through and, right below where Mizuki used to be lay a pair of legs next to a separated torso. Mizuki was dead, and the ANBU had arrived.

* * *

 **A/N: Uh oh, two dead bodies and the two demons? Not a good situation. Anyways, had my first fight scenes, I think that they turned out okayish. But, I would be very happy to be able to write better ones. Hints and tips are appreciated greatly, as well as general reviewing. Follows and faves are also awesome to get. If you do decided to review, don't expect a reply in the AN's of my story. I will PM you when I can. Thank's for reading and good bye.**


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